Northeastern U.S. links

MAINE
  • WASHLAND-NORLANDS LIVING HISTORY CENTER (Livermore): An educational living history center depicting the 1870s period, which aims "to represent the past, present and future of farming as a way of life, as an example of sustainable resource management, and as a source of basic human necessities including food and raw materials for clothing."

MASSACHUSETTS
  • BATTLE ROAD FARMS works to study and reclaim former farm fields and expand agricultural use of national park lands in a way that goes beyond the farm leases or special use permits that are most commonly found at national park sites. BRF is a recent partnership among farmers, educators, and preservationists centered around Minute Man National Historical Park in Boston's western suburban ring. In addition to the National Park Service, partners include the Farm-Based Education Program (see "General Links") and the Farm School in central Mass., whose apprentice farmers work some of the land within the national park and participate in a small-farm incubation program.
  • The BOSTON TREE PARTY invokes two aspects of Boston's heritage--its long history of orchard production and its Revolutionary history--as an integral part of its "decentralized public urban orchard" project, in which delegations from area groups find land that's accessible to the public, plant a pair of apple trees, and pledge to maintain them over time.
  • The ESSEX NATIONAL HERITAGE AREA in northeastern Mass. partners with the state Department of Agricultural Resources and the two-century-old county agricultural society to promote “Buy Local” and community-supported-agriculture efforts within the 500-square-mile heritage area. These efforts include the Northeast Harvest website and companion monthly e-newsletter.
  • HANCOCK SHAKER VILLAGE (Pittsfield): Preserves a western Massachusetts Shaker settlement and serves as a center for reflecting on (and reflecting) Shaker values and how to lead a principled life. Incorporates CSA and renewable energy generation.
  • PLIMOTH PLANTATION (Plymouth): A landmark living history village that tells the story of settlement, subsistence, and encounter by seventeenth-century Natives and English. Its Rare and Heritage Breeds Program includes Milking Devon and Kerry cattle, Arapawa and San Clemente Island goats, wild and Tamworth swine, Wiltshire Horned sheep, Dorking fowl and eastern wild turkeys.
  • SPENCER-PIERCE-LITTLE FARM (Newbury): Focuses on farm animals, in partnership with the MSPCA. A Historic New England property and a National Historic Landmark.
  • various TRUSTEES OF RESERVATIONS properties, including Appleton Farm (Ipswich), Land of Providence Reservation (Holyoke), Powisset Farm (Dover), Weir River Farm (Hingham), and Moraine Farm (Beverly). Several of the these farms offer CSA and/or market gardening.

NEW HAMPSHIRE
  • NEW HAMPSHIRE FARM MUSEUM (Milton): This 50-acre working farm museum incorporates two historic farmsteads and has recently begun offering CSA shares as well as selling its produce in farmers markets and at the museum's Country Store. It is currently pursuing organic certification and maintains some heritage breed animals as part of its educational program.
  • STRAWBERY BANKE MUSEUM (Portsmouth): The Historic Landscapes Department of this preserved seaport neighborhood includes a sustainable agriculture focus in its preservation mission, with heirloom seeds and historic foodways programs.  While not participating directly in commercial food sales, it does link its work with contemporary research and debates about the food supply.

NEW YORK
PENNSYLVANIA
  • WYCK HISTORIC HOUSE AND GARDENS (Germantown): A 300-year-old family farm in what is now Northwest Philadelphia has recently added a Home Farm program that grows food for a weekly on-site farmers market, serves as an interactive, outdoor classroom, and preserves the pastoral landscape integral to the site.

RHODE ISLAND
  • CASEY FARM (Saunderstown): Offers CSA and a weekly farmers market (May to October) at a mid-eighteenth-century farm site overlooking Narragansett Bay. A Historic New England property property.
  • WATSON FARM (Jamestown): Continues a long history of pastoral husbandry on this site by grazing primarily sheep and Red Devon cattle. Sells meat and wool blankets in local markets. A Historic New England property property.

VERMONT
  • MARSH-BILLINGS-ROCKEFELLER NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK (Woodstock): Founded to preserve and interpret the history of land conservation and stewardship itself, this national park unit is involved in many environmental, forestry, and agricultural initiatives. Its primary link with the present-day agricultural sector is through its partnership with the Billings Farm and Museum, a 250-acre working dairy farm and museum of agricultural and rural life located within the park.
  • SHELBURNE FARMS (Shelburne): This non-profit environmental education center and 1,400-acre working farm on the shores of Lake Champlain produces milk and cheese from its herd of Brown Swiss cows, vegetables and flowers for its own use and for market sale, and wood products from 400 acres of managed woodlands. A recent book on the history of the farm traces its history from a patchwork landscape of smaller farms to an elite model estate to an agricultural and conservation educational center.

MULTI-STATE
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